The Bureau of Immigration (BI) warns the public to be cautious as there have been reports email accounts and social media pages that are pretending as official pages to scam unknowing people of their money or private information.
The BI Chief clarified that they are not connected to any of the suspicious accounts.
This was brought up due to an incident back in February wherein the BI found out that there have been an email address that has been sending invoices requesting P25,000 for the release of a package from Japan that is “being held” by the scammer. Another similar complaint extorted P3,000 for the release of a package from Syria.
Additionally, there was a victim who was asked P20,000 for the release of a luggage that is being held by the airport.
If you’re an Overseas Filipino Worker who is constantly online, here are some tips for you to avoid getting scammed:
- Check the page of the social media account that messaged you (official accounts of verified organizations mostly have a high following or a verification badge).
- Do your research. If you think the page is unofficial then do not interact with it. Try searching on the internet if there are similar cases like yours.
- Do not share confidential information such as bank details, credit card information, your name, age, birthdate, etc.
- Never share OTP (One-Time Passwords). Once you give this to them, they will have a high chance to take over or hack your accounts.
- If you feel like it is a scam account, it definitely is a scam account. Trust your guts!
